Are we surprised? No not really, and that is what makes it so damned sad. When they need bailing out we bail them out, but when we want to look at why they – as a sector – failed, “we” (i.e. an anonymous “they”) do not have the stomach for the fight. Read more…

At the end of this week, on 15 September, it will be the fifth anniversary of the collapse of the US investment bank Lehman Brothers. …

The question is whether the financial system is now in shape, and capable of absorbing the inevitable knocks and bruises to which all constructs of frail humans are prone, without inflicting too much cost on the rest of the economy or taxpayers.

What has been done in five years to prevent banks holding entire economies to ransom when they run into difficulties?

My fear is that very little has been done – as Peston seems to say, but I am not sure that much can be done about it. Read more…

It is perhaps a bit odd that lords and MPs on the banking standards commission have chosen to chastise and publicly humiliate two former chief executives of HBOS and the erstwhile chairman – and to ask the regulator whether the three of them should be banned from working in the City.

To be clear, it is not the fact of censure that is odd. It is the timing, and that it’s just these three rather than the great gang of bosses of failed British banks.

Lord Jones of Birmingham (Digby Jones formerly of the CBI and former goat) says we have to be careful that the banks do not decamp to the Gulf because the banks account for 20% “of the entire tax take of the United Kingdom” (BBC News Website 11 January 2011). Others have made similar points. In effect the banks are saying “play the game our way or else”. When the Krays did similar it was called a protection-racket and they were accused of intimidation (Met Police: The Kray twins). The banks may not be literally and directly killing people, but when faced by blackmailers you have to do something. Read more…